It was just an ordinary party at Cornell. Then a student was stabbed to death

This morning, the Ithaca community woke up to the tragic news that a student was stabbed to death at a party on Cornell’s campus.

Anthony Nazaire, a sophomore at Ithaca College and a native of Brooklyn, New York, was only 19 years old when he died in the early hours of this morning.

Nazaire’s dreams of becoming an entrepreneur have been cut short, and nobody expected it to happen.

I was there at the party last night – it was just another Saturday. The party was no different to ones in previous years. It was a group of students coming together to have a good time at the first party of the year – dancing and singing with their friends. People were dressed in workout clothes for the theme of the night as Beyoncé played on the speakers.

The night was beginning to draw to a close when I suggested to my friends that we leave – it was getting late. We got in a taxi, and 10 minutes later, a friend who stayed at the party texted: “…Someone got stabbed?” And then: “Someone told me they think he died.”

We couldn’t believe it. I felt like someone hit me in the stomach. My friends were completely shocked – and we still are.

Afterwards, we heard that there was a huge brawl before the stabbing, and our friends who were there said that the party ended on a weird vibe – that something seemed off. But when we left, it was just a college party wrapping up.

My friend Charisse was still at the party when it happened, and told me: “I’ve never seen anything like that here.”

“By the time I got out there, there were a lot of police cars and a crowd of people on the opposite side of the street,” she said today. “There was someone laying down being assisted by EMS. Then this girl ran across the street and collapsed crying. It was pretty shocking to me because like people legit came out to have a good time and then something like that happened.”

Another friend, Jonathan, had just returned home when he saw a helicopter land outside his dorm to transport a victim to the medical center.

“There were a lot of sirens and then a really bright light from a fire truck shined into my room,” he told me this morning. “The main thing that was going through my mind was ‘What the heck happened tonight?’ Then the helicopter came and landed on the field across the street and I realized someone was going to be airlifted to a trauma center. I didn’t know what exactly happened, but I knew it wasn’t good.”

Since the news of the stabbing, there has been a tremendous outcry of condolences to Nazaire’s family during this awful time. It is beyond sad to see such a promising and bright young man’s life end like this.

A post on Facebook from one of Anthony’s relatives says it all: “Somebody robbed my cousin of his life, his opportunity to prove himself as a young Black man, that it is possible to go to college and have a career, no criminal background, nothing. He wouldn’t hurt no one. Why did you do this to us?”

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